WikiLeaks: Death Squad Eyed in Terror Strategy

By: Alex Sundby
Topics: In The News

The elite Bangladeshi force Rapid Action Battalion clashes with a garment worker during a protest in Dhaka June 29, 2010.

(Credit: AFP/Getty Images)

A Bangladeshi paramilitary force described by human rights organizations as a government death squad and eyed by the United States and the United Kingdom as part of their counterterrorism strategies received training from the British government.

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The Rapid Action Battalion, or RAB, might have received training from the U.S. government had diplomats not noted that it was illegal to assist groups with such poor human rights records, the Guardian newspaper of London reported Tuesday evening.

The disclosure comes from the trove of secret State Department cables released to a number of news outlets by the document-dumping website WikiLeaks.

The cables show that the U.S. and U.K. governments wanted to strengthen the battalion in order to reinforce counterterrorism operations in Bangladesh, the Guardian reported.

The British government's training for RAB officers began three years ago, the Guardian reported. Soldiers received training in "investigative interviewing techniques" and "rules of engagement", the Guardian reported.

Human rights activists estimate that the RAB has been behind more than 1,000 illegal deaths since it was formed six years ago, the Guardian reported. Battalion members have also been accused of using torture. Human Rights Watch described the RAB to the Guardian as a government death squad.

U.S. Ambassador James Moriarty described the battalion in a secret cable as the "enforcement organization best positioned to one day become a Bangladeshi version of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation".

Moriarty wrote in another cable that Washington was "constrained by RAB's alleged human rights violations, which have rendered the organization ineligible to receive training or assistance" under U.S. laws barring funding or training for such military groups, the Guardian reported.

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Alex Sundby
Alex Sundby is an associate news editor for CBSNews.com

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by berlinfoto-2009 December 22, 2010 7:04 AM EST: Ms-enza; is your true identity showing a little bit. If you look at the very early history of the FBI, and even earlier The Bureau of Investigation,under Charles Joseph Bonaparte, The Bureau may or may not been intended as a secret police agency, however with the human genetics involved, it has always been a secret police agency, and this is true today with the FBI. Evil knows no limits, what goes on in secret in America, may never come out but it is evil. Waco, Ruby Ridge, after the Oklahoma City bombing, on the day of the bombing, one man was beaten to death in police custody, and federal agents were present during the beating, and several months latter another man was beaten to death, while in federal custody, these beatings were an attempt to get a confession, my guess is that this is the tip of a extremely large iceberg.; Reply to this comment


by berlinfoto-2009 December 22, 2010 3:02 AM EST: U.S. Ambassador James Moriarty described the battalion in a secret cable as the "enforcement organization best positioned to one day become a Bangladeshi version of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation". Does Ambassador James Moriarty know something most Americans do not? Does the FBI carry out extrajudicial killings, Street Executions? With around six thousand unsolved murder in the United States each and every year, and almost all are shootings, quite a few extrajudicial police killings, could be hidden in the statistics, maybe all of the shootings are police killing citizens.; Reply to this comment


by rheola-2009 December 22, 2010 2:38 AM EST: Copied from SMH comment line.

The great virtue of WikiLeaks is that it has provided documentary evidence of conspiracies that sensible people already surmised existed from a wealth of other evidence e.g. Australian politicians secretly providing inside information to the Americans, advocating war with other countries, offering Australian soldiers for a war against other countries etc (when I read Philip Agee's "Inside the Company. CIA Diary" 35 years ago it was quite obvious that these sorts of things were happening in Australia and indeed who some of the major players were, but of course I wasn't privy to the secret transactions involved).

2. The personal rights and alleged wrongs of Julian Assange are utterly beside the point compared to the Big Picture global realities being partly evidenced by WikiLeaks. Indeed WikiLeaks can be legitimately criticized for the same failing exhibited by mainstream media, academics and politicians - failure to expose the horrendous human cost of the US Alliance War on Terror (8 million excess deaths, so far, as revealed by readily web-accessible, authoritative, UN and medical epidemiological documents) while oh so bravely publishing secret diplomatic gossip (and genuinely bravely by Julian Assange, of course, who has been variously publicly identified by prominent US politicians and commentators as a proper target for rendition, abusive imprisonmennt and indeed assassination).

Proper risk management that is crucial for public safety crucially requires proper freedom of information. Julian Assange and WikiLeaks have done Australia and Humanity a great service while the conniving Lib-Labs and neocons continue to betray and endanger us.; Reply to this comment


by netjunkie1 December 22, 2010 12:55 AM EST: Hackers will wage war on it. I will applaud them, and actively assist if it should get to that point. I sincerely urge you all to do the same.
I no longer believe our US government stands for the people of America, but instead for the top 1 percent of Americans who own more than the bottom 95 percent, and the corporate interests: the banking industry, the military industrial complex, and the insurance industry which is the real enemy of civilized man. Unless you own a share, they think of you as peasants, even to the point to label you that in secret.
The last presidential election and the leadership has all been, at best a good show.
Effective? NO.
Many had hope for change that was promised, but whatever change that has occurred is fleeting and the enemy of civilized man is behind it.
Greed.
Now the corporates have more power than ever, and less visible responsibility.
Whenever a corporation becomes too big to fail, its fascism.
We all know that a Plutocracy has taken over America.
Thanks to true patriots, we have memos detailing their plans.
From the day the words "impeachment is off the table", I knew we were no longer free. Have the guts to admit it, demand responsible government for and by the people....to hell with the rest.
Remove Capitalism and restore Democracy before we are broken.; Reply to this comment


by askagain December 21, 2010 9:10 PM EST: The real damage by WikiLeaks may be dreaded censorship of the internet by our government and other governments. A response may be laws passed by Congress which gives our government greater control over internet activity.; Reply to this comment